More than 1000 gathered on January 17 to protest the enforced closure of the Tote hotel, a victim of changes to Victoria's liquor licensing laws that have seen the popular inner-city music venue upgraded to a "high risk" venue.

An Australian Education Union (AEU) commissioned report by Dr Jim McMorrow has revealed that the federal Labor government continues to fund private schools at the expense of public schools, just as the previous Coalition government did.

The community campaign Save Solar Systems tried to construct a solar power station from cardboard boxes and tin foil on the steps of state Parliament on January 23 to protest against the lack of government support for the planned Mildura solar power station.

On January 18, the 250 Tamil asylum seekers in Merak, Indonesia, had spent 100 days on their boat in appalling conditions. This is despite almost half of them being already recognised by the United Nations as refugees.

A global day of protest was held in solidarity with them, and against...

Eleven men detained in the Christmas Island detention centre have been charged and appeared in court on January 20 over a fight that broke out among 150 asylum seekers on November 21. They were remanded until a later date.

The Socialist Alliance's candidate in the February 13 Altona district bi-election, Margarita Windisch, has welcomed state transport minister Lynne Kosky's resignation as overdue. But she says Kosky was just a symptom of a larger problem for Victorians — a negligent Labor government with the...

A group of activists known as the "Newcastle 23" went before the Newcastle Local Court on January 19. The 23 are charged with "rail safety offences" on December 20, after they stopped a coal train in response to the failure of the Copenhagen climate talks to agree to adequate binding emissions...

Avatar is real: the fictional planet of Pandora exists in South and Central America, and the Na'vi peoples are being displaced and killed right now. The names are different, but the facts are almost the same.

Politicians and newspapers love to revere a war hero from Afghanistan. It's strange, then, that they haven't got round to Lance-Corporal Joe Glenton, the British soldier who has been arrested for addressing an anti-war protest in October.

On June 10, 2006, the commander of US-run Guantanamo Bay military camp, Rear Admiral Harry Harris, said three detainees, Salah Al-Aslami, Yasser Talal al-Zahrani and Mani Shaman al-Utaybi, had committed suicide the night before in an act of "asymmetrical warfare".

Children are the biggest victims of the war in Afghanistan, a January 6 AFP article said. It quoted an Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM) report, which said more than 1050 people under 18 years of age were killed in 2009 alone.

Since the earthquake struck Haiti on January 12, there has been a global outpouring of support. Many people, horrified by the scenes of sheer devastation, the astronomical death toll and the struggle of survivors to gain access to medicines, food and shelter, are left wondering: why so many?...

Debt and military intervention are recurring themes in Haiti's history. During the epic 1791-1804 war of independence, Haiti's rebelling slaves had to fight not only their French former masters, but invading Spanish and British armies. In 1825, to overcome an international blockade, Haiti agreed...

The December United Nations Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen ended without achieving any binding agreement to cut carbon emissions. Extreme actions were taken by Denmark to ensure that protests were stifled and voices not heard.

During the United Nations Copenhagen climate summit in December, fresh allegations emerged that unscrupulous carbon traders were buying up the rights to the carbon stored in forests in Papua New Guinea from indigenous landowners.

About 100 people gathered outside the Embassy Suites in the heart of New York's financial district on January 13 to rally against the Second Annual Carbon Trading Summit. The summit was organised for the most powerful institutions and industries to discuss new opportunities at profit in the...

Right-wing columnist David Brooks began his January 15 New York Times piece by reminding his readers that when, in October 1989, the San Francisco Bay Area was hit by an earthquake similar in magnitude to the one that devastated Haiti on January 12, the death toll was 63.

Waving banners saying "Yes to expropriation!" workers from the supermarket chain Exito celebrated the decision of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to nationalise the French-Colombian owned transnational company for speculation offences on January 17.

On January 19, German political police raided the Berlin and Dresden offices of several anti-Nazi groups, including the Dresden Nazi-Free Alliance, No Pasaran, Red Stuff and the left-wing party Die Linke.

Thousands of posters, stickers and leaflets for an anti-Nazi protest on February 13...

For decades, there was no socialist party of significance in Malaysia. But in 2009, the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) made some impressive gains. The party more than doubled in size and had members elected to state and national parliament for the first time.

The "open letter" published below has been initiated by the Canada Haiti Action Network. CHAN is calling for individuals and organisations to add their names to the statement, You can add your name here

Left-wing Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa said that a conspiracy to destabilise his country, funded by the right-wing factions in the United States, has been uncovered, a January 4 Juventud Rebelde article said.

Emergildo Criollo, 51, is a community leader of the indigenous Cofan nationality and has lived in Dureno since his small community was displaced from their ancestral lands. Since a massive oil spill in the 1960s contaminated the Aguarico River, his family and community have...

It was pretty clear that Democrat candidate Martha Coakley's goose was cooked before the polls closed in the January 19 Massachusetts election to fill deceased Democrat Ted Kennedy's seat in the US Senate.

First, only the Democratic candidate's advisers were claiming that their "internal...

The recent murder of Nitin Garg highlighted continuing violence against Indian students. It has led some to ask "Is Australia a racist country?" and put others on the defensive about Australia's racist image.

The ongoing Northern Territory intervention, which required the suspension of...

A nightclub in Singapore held an event on January 16 encouraging women to have their breast size judged in exchange for alcohol. Material for the event titled Fill my Cups invited women to "step right up to the Boobie Booth and flaunt what you've got".

Avatar is a visually stunning marvel of film technology, as many reviewers will tell you. But what really stands out in James Cameron's newest film is its unabashed critique of corporate greed — and its inspiring tale of solidarity and resistance against occupation.

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In these days of growing media concentration, Green Left Weekly is a proudly independent voice committed to human and civil rights, global peace and environmental sustainability, democracy and equality. By printing the news and ideas the mainstream media won't, Green Left Weekly exposes the lies and distortions of the power brokers and helps us to better understand the world around us.